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Abstract

Long-range interactions play a key role in several phenomena of quantum
physics and chemistry. To study these phenomena, analog quantum simulators
provide an appealing alternative to classical numerical methods. Gate-defined
quantum dots have been established as a platform for quantum simulation, but
for those experiments the effect of long-range interactions between the
electrons did not play a crucial role. Here we present the first detailed
experimental characterization of long-range electron-electron interactions in
an array of gate-defined semiconductor quantum dots. We demonstrate significant
interaction strength among electrons that are separated by up to four sites,
and show that our theoretical prediction of the screening effects matches well
the experimental results. Based on these findings, we investigate how
long-range interactions in quantum-dot arrays may be utilized for analog
simulations of artificial quantum matter. We numerically show that about ten
quantum dots are sufficient to observe binding for a one-dimensional $H_2$-like
molecule. These combined experimental and theoretical results pave the way for
future quantum simulations with quantum dot arrays and benchmarks of numerical
methods in quantum chemistry.